Image of McMurdo Sound from iStock,
Image Credit: James Moore, Stock photo ID:1034262342, Upload date: September 11, 2018, Categories: Stock Photos | McMurdo Sound
Welcome to the second episode of this week! This is part 2 of both the episode.
In this second part, I discuss the McMurdo Station and Sound, as well the future design that will be implemented there. Additionally, I finish up the episode briefly talking about Coastalock in San Diego Bay and the Underwater Museum in Cannes, France. This is part of my three episode week! So listen to part 1, and enjoy Episode 10 as well as this one! Up above, is a picture of the McMurdo Sound as it currently is. And down below I have attached a few pictures of Antarctica. So without further ado, please enjoy the transcript and episode!
TRANSCRIPT:
Grab your Piña coladas and tiny umbrellas, it’s time for Architecture, Coffee, & Ink.
30 second Intro song
Hello, this is Hollywood C. and you’re listening to Architecture, Coffee, & Ink. A podcast dedicated to introducing concepts, detailing out designs, and tackling the architecture you might not realize the meaning behind. I’m your hostess and I am here today to start introducing you to the designs that make you wonder why.
tag line: So I ask you to brew your coffee, grab your sketch book and pen, and let’s begin.
Welcome to the second part of this week’s BONUS episode! Doing three episodes in a week has been kind of exhilarating. But also kind of weird, because I really don’t have anything new to talk about before the episode begins. While it continues to rain down hard here, it’s nice sometimes to think about escaping and daydream of sunny weather, and drinks with fruit and tiny umbrellas, and several of the projects we are going to be discussing today, really reminded me of that vibe. But first, I have relocated my temporary recording studio, so that my cat doesn’t find me. Apparently she was pulling on my microphone cord the entire time I was recording and popping it in and out. I couldn’t for the life of me, figure out why my sound was so weird. I don’t use autotune or anything like that, but I do record with a podcasting mic, just because my laptop speakers aren’t anything to write home about. But, I think the only thing she would have loved more, is if I had basted the wires in catnip. I was re-recording over and over again until like 3AM, and she was living her best life, so at least one of us was happy. Don’t worry, I will pay the cat tax, and have some images of her up on the part 1 blog post. But starting next week, I am going to be re-think and kicking off some Instagram posts, and doing an update, as well as getting it up to speed. So look forward to seeing more pictures and images popping up, especially if you are not a big blog person. But otherwise, let’s get onto the main topic!
On Tuesday, I focused on bringing you background information about various aspects of sea travel, oceans, and AUVs vs ROVs. Today we are going to be just talking about case studies and designs! Again, anyone would suffers from thalassophobia, please give this episode a skip. But check out Episode 10 which has been released at the same time as this one!
So this episode is going to cover both the very old and the very new in water based designs. So to kick off the episode, we are first going to cover McMurdo Sound, and the McMurdo research station. Since the Sound itself is water, we are going to sneak this into this episode. While there are other bases in and around Antarctica, I am currently planning and researching a spin off episode for that, so we are going to focus on here first.
So the McMurdo Sound is located in Antarctica, extends roughly 55 km or 34 miles, and touches the Ross Sea and Island Shelf that we talked about last episode. So for anyone who doesn’t know, a Sound is the sea itself, it’s a geographical feature, not a musical note in this case, not to say that the Sound is quiet! It is home to a variety of creatures, including the Weddell Seal and a series of “anti-freeze protein containing fish” according to the website for the McMurdo Oceanographic Observatory website. On the blog I will be posting a link to their youtube page if you want to check out both pictures and sounds recorded there. But since they are copyrighted, I can’t play them on the podcast. BUT! I found sound of a baby Weddell Seal pup, that I can play you everyone with a glacier in the background-just to give you a taste of what some of the sounds of the area would be. So, please enjoy this clip:
Within the Sound itself, is the McMurdo Ice Shelf, McMurdo Station and Scott Base. On Ross Island, which touches the Ice Shelf, is Mount Erebus, a volcano that extends up to 12500 ft or 3,800 m. This volcano is active, and actually holds the title of the “southernmost active volcano on Earth” according to Wikipedia. To be fair, I did double check this fact, and this title seemed to hold true across the board. But the Sound itself was discovered in 1841, by Sir James Clark Ross, hence Ross Island, chartering the HMS Terror for the expedition.
And yes, for any history buffs or lore buffs, you may have noticed the name of the ship. Yes, this is THAT ship. The HMS Terror, is the ship of that was eventually ‘lost’ in the Northwest Passage of 1845. I included a link to the wiki page in my notes in case anyone wants to read up on it, because if you are not prepared, the images that pop up when you search for it, can be graphic if you don’t have safe search on. The ship was originally a Vesuvius-class bomb ship until it ended up being converted to polar expeditions. While it safely made the explorations to Antarctica it failed to survive the Artic. However, each of its journeys, including the horrible journey up north, it was accompanied by the HMS Erebus, a Hecla class bomb ship. I believe that the name is what lead to the HMS Terror being so infamous, plus several shows and movies being loosely based off of the stories, while the HMS Erebus seems to be not as well known. The Terror was rediscovered in September 2016, while the Erebus was found in September 2014 and both were given back to Canada and the Inuit People later on.
Getting back to the Sound: the area was named for Lieutenant Archibald McMurdo who was also abroad the ship. However, while the previous expeditions chartered the region, Robert Falcon Scott was the one who officially created the first base camp, including the infamous Discovery Hut in 1902-you most likely have seen pictures of this, as the Hut or a memorial of it, is still erected on the Island to this day. So, while the history of the region goes on, it’s the 1902 date that launches the start of a series of explorations, that end up in the eventual creation of McMurdo Station and Scott Base. Created in February 16, 1956, the Station is located along the sound, and underneath the jurisdiction of the United States with the New Zealand based Scott Base, a mere 3km or 1.9m along the road. The base is a first stop before supplies make it further inland, and was established as part of Operation Deep Freeze. As you may have guessed from the proximity to Scott Base, one of the partners in the project was New Zealand, along with the UK, France, Norway, Japan, Chile, the U.S.S.R. and Argentina. Throughout its history, it has seen nuclear power, generators, you name it. However, it’s the future and recent past that interests us, dear listeners. So, within the base, there was one thing that the United States was originally failing to do. Prior to 2017, there was no long term studies being done on the long-term ocean conditions. So, In 2017 a two year project was launched that created the McMurdo Oceanographic Observatory. This Observatory is roughly 70 feet or 21 m beneath the water. My favorite part of this project, was at the time, you could actually go onto either the website or YouTube and watch live streams of the ocean. And Listen.
God, it was amazing to Listen sometimes. Altogether, this project was underneath Paul A. Cziko. While it lists the full credentials on the website, he was with the University of Oregon, and funded by the U.S. National Science Foundation Office of Polar Programs and of course supported by the US Antarctic Program. The ice is roughly 8 ft or 2.44 m thick, so while diving begin from the McMurdo Base in 1961, and continue, the truth is, having cameras and sensors running, provides data that humans quite frankly would have never been able to find or duplicate on their own. Now, as I stated, the project completed in 2019, and while that doesn’t mean that it won’t happen again, I noticed you can really tell who did their homework research wise, if the article was published after that date. I ran into a series of very funny claims, that even a few extra minutes would have made them realized their mistake. Don’t worry, none of the sources I included were one of those. But like I stated in the start of the episode, Check your sources, Check your facts, and more importantly check me.
So casting ourselves back to 2012, OZ Architecture was actually contacted by the McMurdo Station to create “more efficient architecture”. When I mentioned all those different types of power sources? Unfortunately, due to both the size and planning of the base, at first the base was not the most energy savvy. Based on a series of estimates I saw across several sites, it seems that there is a large variation in the population, changing between roughly 250 to 1,200 or more people between winter to summer. As one can guess, it gets quite a bit colder in the winter, so many people only stay part of the year, or rotate out. Which, I guess is good, because, instant freezer for a good chunk of the year. But as designers, a major hurdle to overcome. Add into effect the other conditions, like the challenges being even by an ice shelf present-like anchor ice. This is where the water is so colder underneath ice shelves, it causes ice to gather on the ocean floor. Which can be pulled up by accident or weigh down anchors. So in addition to the normal challenges, you also have to factor in ice that only forms on the ocean floor underneath extreme conditions. And sometimes 24 hour sunlight.
But OZ Architecture seems to have certainly delivered. They decided to re-design the base into a six campus building, and the renders are absolutely stunning. Moved it to being roughly 300,000 sq ft. or 27870.9 square meters campus, with walk ways on the exterior. One of the key concepts I saw repeated multiple times was conservation. In addition to conservation of energy, they both maintained space and provided more opportunities for recreation and general living. According to their website, they are currently under construction under a $300 million USD contract. So my favorite part of the renders, is that they are creating sleek designs that also capture the snow and terrain of Antarctica. And that the insides they show, could be anywhere in the world, with the amount of lighting and way the spaces are designed.
I am going to broadly speak for everyone when I say that most of our understanding and images of Antarctica are solely due a mixture of documentaries and horror movies, so this change seems like an absolutely huge difference. Additionally in the renders, the materials are light, and airy, with plenty of windows and open spaces. The current base is somewhere around 100 buildings, at least according to the various different websites I looked at. So condensing everything is probably a dream come true. I know, as I unpack my holiday boxes, everyone would love for me to condense. But factoring in the extreme temperatures?
Altogether, I look forward to seeing how it progresses and wish everyone luck on construction and their research-stay cozy everyone! I will definitely be keeping a listen out for any future long term projects for ocean studies again.
Additionally, in this episode, I wanted to bring up and cover a few different projects that deal with reef and coastal restorations. So I mentioned last week a few projects by name, but I decided this week to just finish off the episode by just spending, well a paragraph or two about two projects that I would encourage additional research. One day I may come back to these, but given how much I discussed the Base, I wanted to briefly mention how they are progressing underwater designs.
So, instagram has been amazing source for seeing images of exotic underwater hotels, and below water pools, and videos of scuba divers bringing you deliveries. But what about the ecological designs? One such is the Coastalock, which provides a ton of crevasses for creatures. An article in dezeen has a series of images, of these cute and adorable shapes. To be completely honest, while I watched a video and looked at pictures of them being lifted into place, I really feel like I could just pick one up. They are extremely classy, and interlock wonderfully, and double as a defensive measures.
Another way of accomplishing ecological and political, is Jason deCaires Taylor’s Underwater Museum. Located in Cannes, France, it is a series of breathtaking sculptures. That can be accessed via snorkeling and diving, and is a total of 6, on a series of bases . And Honestly, based off the size, you could probably see them on a clear day just from swimming across the top. Apparently the artist made sure that each sculpture is based off a real person, local to the region and carved from concrete with aggregates and a surface that promotes growth. Each sculpture is cut and shaped into two halves or ‘fragments’ and is a political statement about the ocean. One of the most powerful images to me, is the where the face is pointed to the right of the image, and the split between the fragments is extremely visible, front and center. The camera is clearly tilted, with the surface, lolling over-head, creating a canopy or ceiling with the surface texture. And the blue abyss of the Mediterranean Sea extends out beyond what the eye can see. For me, that is incredibly comforting. Especially once growth hits, seeing life and extending and imaging possibilities of what could be. I take comfort in the infinite, though I know to some that’s overwhelming. To me, I view it as, the knowledge that something is out there, that there is more beyond me is a promise.
The Underwater Museum is located at a depth of 3-4m and was actually first installed in 2021, so a brand new project! I love on his website, he includes the plant palette of the posidonia sea grass meadows
From <https://www.underwatersculpture.com/projects/underwater-museum-cannes/>
Which I am directly leaving in the transcript the link to, because it is full of great details, and good descriptions. This draws reference to the Man in the Iron Mask. So because I am that much of nerd, I will mention the Man in the Iron Mask, as it was more than just a movie. Although a professor claims to have solved the mystery in his book and that the man in question was Eustache Dauger-a nobleman? I believe, the Man in the Iron Mask is an officially unnamed prisoner, whose identity was romanticized over and over again. The movie focused on it being a secret brother of the king, because this was the most popular theory pushed out by Voltaire. But most importantly, by Alexander Dumas, aka the writer of the Three Musketeers, one, if not my favorite novels when I was a kid. As the area is the region where he was imprisoned, what a fitting place.
Again, this episode will have all of the sources from parts 1 and 2, listed on both posts, because I was often referring to pieces interchangeably when writing both episodes. The list is going to be massive, I have been compiling it and I could have genuinely kept talking about this topic for absolute hours. Thank you, for tuning in, Once again a big thank you to all my listeners! A quick call to action: Please rate and review, share with your friends, neighbors, and family, your professor-whomever you think needs some architecture in their life. We again have a Facebook page and private group, both of which are under the same name: Architecture, Coffee, & Ink. The answer to the question-who is the host-is Hollywood, like the city. And second question is just your opinion, and I might just use it as a recommendation for a show with a little shout out. If you want to either be featured, or have a case study suggestion or perhaps just want to share a story of your favorite design or experience, you can either find me at Architecture, Coffee, & Ink the website is: https://architectureink.design.blog/ . Insta is now architecturecoffeeandink! Just like the email address! Everything will be linked in the show notes. You can also email me at architecturecoffeeandink@gmail.com all spelt out without the ampersands or commas. Again, check out the other episode coming out with this one, And as always,
May your coffee mugs be full, and your ink wells never run dry.
60 secs end song re-looped.
SOURCES:
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Negahdaripour, Shahriar, Xun Xu, and Ali Khamene. “A vision system for real-time positioning, navigation, and video mosaicing of sea floor imagery in the application of ROVs/AUVs.” In Proceedings Fourth IEEE Workshop on Applications of Computer Vision. WACV’98 (Cat. No. 98EX201), pp. 248-249. IEEE, 1998.
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Lizzie Crook | 4 March 2021 Leave a comment. “Jason Decaires Taylor Creates Underwater Museum of Cannes ‘to Draw More People Underwater.’” Dezeen, March 5, 2021. https://www.dezeen.com/2021/03/04/underwater-museum-of-cannes-jason-decaires-taylor/.
Lizzie Crook | 5 March 2021 Leave a comment. “Man-Made Rock Pools at San Diego Bay Waterfront Double as Coastal Defences.” Dezeen, March 8, 2021. https://www.dezeen.com/2021/03/05/coastalock-rock-pools-san-diego-bay-econcrete/.
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